Andy Cohen and Howie Mandel are clearing the air after an interaction they shared regarding Mandel’s 2023 interview with Tom Sandoval.
Dropping in on Thursday’s episode of Andy Cohen Live, the Deal or No Dealhost, 68, provided context to his sit-down with the Vanderpump Rules villain, 40, which came at the height of “Scandoval.” At the time of the April interview, Cohen, 55, called out Mandel for not informing himself on the situation prior to talking with Sandoval.
Mandel, who said he only “started watching” the Bravo series after chatting with Sandoval said he was ill-informed and possibly misled as to how the situation with the Vanderpump Rules love triangle really went down.
“He said he broke up [with Ariana Madix]. He said, you know, he told her, and he told me a story about how, you know, she wanted to have kids and he went, ‘Are you crazy? I broke up with you,'” Mandel said, adding that his interview felt like “having a deposition and then watching the courtroom.”
It later came out that Sandoval had been cheating on Madix with their Vanderpump Rules co-star Rachel Leviss for at least seven months before “Scandoval” broke.
During an episode of Watch What Happens Live around that time, Cohen called Mandel a “jackhole” for having Sandoval on his Howie Mandel Does Stuff Podcast and seemingly siding with him despite not knowing the intricacies of the situation.
“Tonight’s Jackhole [of the Night] goes to the fact that Howie Mandel apparently didn’t know what he was getting himself into with his interview of Tom Sandoval today,” Cohen said. “Because it seems like maybe he didn’t do his homework?”
In their new sit-down interview, Mandel told the WWHL host that he didn’t have all of the necessary information and that he was told Sandoval had attempted to break up with Madix and that both were looking into options for having children together.
“I go, ‘Well, that’s not what he told me. He told me that he broke up with her and it was crazy that she wanted to have kids,'” Mandel said.
Even though he admitted he wasn’t fully informed on the situation, Mandel said he did not appreciate the amount of “hate” he received for ” just allowing a guy to have a platform,” which, in turn, he says allowed Sandoval to “bury himself.”
“Don’t you respect me for that? Why am I a jackhole?” Mandel asked Cohen directly.
Ultimately, Cohen said it ended up working out for him during the Vanderpump Rules reunion — which he moderated — as it allowed Sandoval to be properly “grilled.”
“It kind of saved the grilling for me later at the reunion, so it actually, as it turns out, maybe I should give you the mazel instead because we do a jackhole and a mazel,” Cohen joked.
Cohen and Mandel had previously buried the hatchet in June when they settled their beef in DMs shared on an episode of his radio show.
“Howie Mandel DM’d me over the break,” Cohen said at the time. “He DM’d me and said, ‘You’re making amazing TV. I was honored to be your jackhole.’ I loved that and I DM’d him back and I said, ‘Howie, being in a feud with you,’ feud in quotes, ‘was my honor,’ with a bunch of hearts.”
“I feel like Howie and I, we’re back,” he added.
